Through this workshop, RCA aims to foster the development of proposals that explore research questions about how North Dakotans extend the healthy, active years of life and how we effectively prevent or treat age-related diseases. We encourage faculty from the biological, behavioral, design, engineering, social and economic fields to apply to participate. In addition, we seek faculty who are interested in participating as computational core collaborators on healthy aging proposals.

WHAT TO EXPECT

Facilitated by KnowInnovation, this workshop will involve the co-creation of research ideas and development of teams that will go on to create proposals related to the theme. Participants will be expected to engage with other participants in a creative, free-thinking environment--away from everyday routines and responsibilities--and immerse themselves in a collaborative process around this important theme. Over the course of three days, KnowInnovation and a research director, Adam Davey, will facilitate the generation of ideas and proposals around the theme of Aging. Participants will be part of a multidisciplinary group who will work to build a shared understanding of the challenge, define specific research questions, and generate novel ideas for research proposals. Initiatives similar to this fostered by KnowInnovation build diverse teams that span the stages of academic careers and disciplines, resulting in high quality, productive research teams addressing the challenging, big ideas and often securing high levels of funding following other such campus initiatives.

This planning grant program seeks to initiate early-stage project development to help catalyze collaborative, interdisciplinary teams among diverse disciplines in order to pursue innovative, ambitious solutions to impactful research questions that fit within NDSU’s strategic priorities, or align with prior and/or existing research investments at NDSU. Priority will go to teams without a prior track record of collaboration, or to teams that are expanding to include new disciplinary expertise.

Team composition should be reflective of the nature of the proposed research and the team’s approach should rely on the perspective and expertise of multiple disciplines. This program is intended to help teams develop collaborations and prepare to pursue external sponsored research support for the proposed project. North Dakota has made it a priority to invest in the diversification of the state economy through research, and NDSU faculty are uniquely poised to bring their expertise together in teams to address challenges that cannot be solved by a single discipline.